December 31, 2018

Well, it’s New Year’s Eve. Time to look back over the last 12 months. I begin most years feeling like this year will be special and with new experiences. And certainly this has been true for many. When this year began, however, I figured it wouldn’t be special. It’d just be the same old stuff I do every year. Well, let’s see what happened.

January: Common Area Tree

-What a ridiculous ad.
-Time to head to Greenbelt to see them vote to lower the voting age!
-Except everything is encased in ice and it would be incredibly hazardous to drive all the way there.
-Going to have to miss this one.
-But they did it!
-Why is someone waking me this early on a Saturday morning?
-Oh. Shit.
-A dead tree seemed to have gotten in a fight with my parked car.
-Someone get this tree off my poor car!
-Oh, wow, windshield survived. Just this minor dent.
-My car is a champ!
-Seems Hawaii had a missile alert snafu.

-JavaScript
-Black Panther
-No, raising the gun age to 21 won’t stop shootings. It just pins the blame on youth.
-Finally a ski evening before the season is out. It’s at least open this time but not much snow.
-This week in the United States: The Orange Thing and Joe Biden are gearing up for a fistfight, and the most popular book out now is a gay fanfic about Mike Pence’s rabbit.
-Time for March for our Lives!
-And for Easter weekend… AwesomeCon!

April: AGI

-AwesomeCon again, for Easter Fools Day.
-I bought a lot of refrigerator magnets.
-Ready Player One
-Was that really the best way to handle the Apu thing? Because it really wasn’t.
-March for Science isn’t all rainy this time. Not as many people though.
-It’d help to fill out the form correctly.
-Caps are in the playoffs again, heading to the second round against the Penguins, again. Sigh. Here we go again.

May: Walk Off

-Star Wars Day at Nats Park! Day before my birthday.
-They lost.
–WES threw me a birthday party!
-Not technically. But platform was a party and it was my birthday, so there you go.
-Back at Nats Park next day on my birthday.
-They’re losing.
-They came back in the ninth.
-Nats win!
-Whoa, the Caps actually beat the Penguins and advanced to the conference final!
-Royal wedding.
-Caps are about to be eliminated from Eastern Conference final.
-Well, they won Game 6 in a shut out. That’s good.
-And Game 7 is a shut out, too.
-Caps are going to the Stanley Cup final!!!
-I’ll head over to the gaming section and glance in the case just for shits and giggles, not like they’ll have it-
-Holy shit, they have it!
-SNES CLASSIC!!!!
-Now for Stanley Cup final against Vegas Golden Knights.
-…
-WHAT?!?!?!

June: It’s Not a Desert Mirage

-Caps have pulled ahead in the series.
-Time for Game 5.
-WTF did you do?!
-Game 5 is tied.
-We’re up by one in Game 5.
-Oh, what’s happening to the clock?
-Almost over.
-Is 0.6 seconds enough time for the Golden Knights to tie it up?
-Oh my God.
-OH MY GOD
-It’s for real. I’m seeing this.
-That’s MY team!
–CAPITALS WIN THE STANLEY CUP!!!!
-And just two days later…
-JUSTIFY WINS THE TRIPLE CROWN!!!!
-So Alex Ovechkin, Braden Holtby, and jockey Mike Smith drank out of the Stanley Cup with Jimmy Fallon because of course they did.
-Anthony Bourdain
–Flag Day.
-Suddenly a very busy week.
-Didn’t make it to the rally about the immigrant family separations.

July: Would

-My turn to bring snacks!
-Now to make chili con… corn. I guess.
-And ‘splosions.
-The country is sparkling once again.
-Looks like Scott Pruitt is out.
-Sunflowers
-France wins the World Cup over Croatia
-Orange Thing meets with Putin and straight up commits treason in plain sight.
-Does that mean what I think it means?

-Stop saying “and no one is talking about it“.
-Eighth Grade
-Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
-o snap, anonymous op-ed from inside Orange Thing administration
-It’s the 17th anniversary.
-Dinner with some cool people
-BoJack Horseman!
-Nats game!
-And they actually shut out the Mets 6-0!
-If people could not launch into “kids these days” discussions, like, ever, that’d be great.
-Brett Kavanaugh did some bad things. He retorts by yelling about beer or something.
-Bazaar!

So that’s that. Less than an hour to go before that big crystal thing in Times Square makes its descent. So did anything interesting happen? Capitals won the Stanley Cup. World politics continues to be totally cuckoo. Me? Didn’t manage to go on any excursions this time. A lot of my friends had an interesting year. I just sort of sat here and watched it all go by.

Maybe in 2019 I should do a little more again. Sounds like a plan. It’ll be along in half an hour…